


a bit extraordinary

by nowrunalong



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-28
Updated: 2015-04-06
Packaged: 2018-03-20 00:18:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3629616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowrunalong/pseuds/nowrunalong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Jenny is adopted and the Doctor is her biological father.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted by allthemidnightmemories over on Tumblr :)

The Doctor has never been an ordinary man, and extraordinary things often happen to extraordinary people.

A child prodigy and later a renowned scientist, John Smith—nicknamed the Doctor after he earned his first doctorate at the age of fourteen—is well-known within scientific circles as being one of the cleverest people in the world.

Not that he’d ever let you forget it.

Perhaps he should have expected it, then. The kidnapping. He isn’t the paranoid sort, though, so he didn’t.

It was a bit of an odd experience, he'd explained to the police officer. His captors had taken him to a lab and extracted a tissue sample. (He’d wiggled his hand around then, displaying the odd cut on the top of it.) Then they’d let him go. No ransom demand; nothing else.

Despite the blindfold, the Doctor was able to provide from memory the way he’d travelled and the cops had found the lab in question. They’d allowed the eighteen-year-old to inspect the equipment and he’d declared that it looked suspiciously like his captors were working in the field of human cloning. The police shut it down for ‘suspected illegal activities’.

They never found the baby.

—

_18 years later_

Jenny Noble has never been an ordinary girl, and extraordinary things often happen to extraordinary people.

Unfortunately, nothing particularly interesting has ever happened to Jenny. What if she were kidnapped? Would that be interesting or terrifying? Maybe both. She poses the question aloud.

“Only you’d think being kidnapped might be fun.” Donna says, amused. “You that bored?"

“Well, I have homework. I don’t want to do it.” Jenny wrinkles her nose.

“Sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do.”

This brings out a smile on Jenny’s face.

“If you’re the pragmatic one, what am I?”

“You’re the wild one,” Donna answers. She smiles, too. “Speaking of wild—you got any plans this week?”

“Amy’s having a party tomorrow!”

“What? Another one? I swear they didn’t have that many parties when I was in school.”

Jenny laughs. “You probably just didn’t know about them. Besides, that wasn’t all that long ago.”

“No. I suppose it wasn’t,” Donna agrees.

“Anyways.” Jenny gets up from the table, grabbing their cups and bringing them to the sink before coming back to stand next to Donna, hands resting lightly on her chair. “Guess I’ll do that homework now.”

Donna wishes her good luck and Jenny skips out of the kitchen.

—

Jenny doesn’t do her homework.

Ever since she’d finally saved up enough for a computer, she’d been spending a lot of time on the internet, doing research for a personal project.

For a genius, Jenny doesn't spend much time doing work. The more her teachers had tried to steer her towards physics—she understands numbers better than any other student at her school—the more she'd rebelled against them. She currently devotes most of her school-related time to the rugby team.

Luckily for the coach, Jenny is as good at rugby as she is at physics.

Her personal project has nothing to do with rugby, though.

She brings up Google for the umpteenth time, clicking through archives to articles she’s already read. Most news articles published eighteen years ago aren't particularly interesting, Jenny thinks, but she skims through everything she can find.

She scrolls down the side of the webpage she’s on, looking over the snippets of articles listed in the sidebar.

“ _On this day…_ ”

The caption is underneath the image of a smiling young man with messy brown hair, probably close to Jenny’s age. He looks oddly familiar: she thinks that she’s seen him in the news before. She clicks, curiosity piqued.

“ _On this day, eighteen years ago, Doctor John Smith was reported missing. Hours later, he was found near his home in London…_ ”

Blah, blah. Jenny skips down to the end of the page.

“ _… facility was shut down for suspected attempt at creating a machine capable of human cloning. The scientists were never found, nor was any evidence that they had achieved any successes._ "

Jenny’s hand freezes on the mouse.

—

She’s uncharacteristically quiet at dinner, focusing on eating with her mouth closed rather than relaying tales about her day. Donna notices but waits until they’re standing side-by-side at the kitchen counter, doing the dishes, before asking her if she’s alright.

“Yep! I’m great.”

Donna isn’t convinced so Jenny flashes her a grin, but it seems different than usual somehow.

“You sure?” Donna sets down the plate she’s drying and puts her hand on Jenny’s upper arm comfortingly. "You know I’m always here if you want to talk.”

Jenny just nods.

—

The next night, Jenny’s not home by two like she generally is after a party.

That in itself isn’t too unusual. She has a lot of friends, and she likes to be out doing things with people. Still, Donna worries.

At three, she phones Amy.

“Jenny still there with you?”

“Jenny? I thought she was home sick?"

Donna’s heart starts to race.

“No,” she says slowly, actively working to stop her voice from rising in pitch and volume—her parents and grandfather are fast asleep. “She’s fit as a fiddle. You got any idea where she might be?"

“Nope. I’m sorry, Donna. Jenny left at around nine—said she wasn’t feeling well. She was gonna go home and sleep.”

“Right. Thanks anyway, Amy.”

“‘Course.”

Donna hangs up and stares at the phone, anxiety growing stronger by the second.

Where the hell was Jenny?

—

_Six hours earlier_

“And it chased after me! Six blocks, and I ran the whole way!”

“It’s just a cat, Doctor! Still, 's'funny he followed you so far. He must like you. Don’t you, puss?”

The blonde kneels down to scratch the cat between its ears and it rubs against her legs, purring loudly. 

The Doctor looks a bit affronted.

“Rose Tyler! Are you going to dinner with me, or that cat?”

Rose doesn’t dignify that question with a verbal answer, standing up and linking her arm through her date’s with a small smirk.

“Good choice!”

“I can still change my mind,” she tells him as they stroll off down the street.

The offending cat doesn’t follow this time.

—

It’s past nine by the time they leave the restaurant: Rose had left work late and the Doctor had met her there when she’d gotten out.

There’s a short blonde girl loitering outside, back against the wall of the building; Rose flashes a smile in her direction. The girl smiles back.

The smile grows wider as the Doctor follows Rose out the door, catching her hand and swinging it between them as they walk, and the shorter blonde steps out in front of the couple on the sidewalk.

She looks the Doctor in the eye, tilts her head, and then grins.

“Hello, Dad."


	2. Chapter 2

“Sorry,” the Doctor says, surprised, “but who are you?”

The girl looks up at him appraisingly. 

“You’re a bit taller than I expected. Don’t look much like you, do I? Still, suppose it’s better that way. I like my hair more than yours. Yours is just sort of brown.”

“What’s wrong with—what are you talking about?” 

“Doctor,” Rose leans into him, linking her arm through his. “What’s going on?”

The girl turns to Rose.

“Your hair is beautiful,” she says matter-of-factly. “Mine’s a bit the same colour, isn’t it? I’m sorry—I haven’t introduced myself! I’m Jenny Noble.”

She doesn’t seem dangerous, Rose thinks, but she certainly isn’t making any sense. Still, she decides to humor her.

“I’m Rose. This is the Doctor. But you seem to know him already. Guess a lot of people do, if they’re into science.”

Jenny nods, sending her blonde ponytail swinging.

“Just read an article about you yesterday!” she says, turning back to the Doctor. “You were kidnapped eighteen years ago today.”

He doesn’t answer, just looks at her carefully.

“They took a tissue sample from you, “ she continues. "The fellows with the cloning technology.” She waves now, wiggling her fingers in the same way he does. “Hello!”

“No,” he says, shaking his head. He takes a step back. “You can’t be. Rose, let’s go.”

Rose’s eyes flicker back and forth between the Doctor and Jenny. The shorter blonde’s face is falling fast, and Rose can’t help but feel a pang of sympathy towards her.

She turns with the Doctor, though, looking back, face apologetic.

Jenny follows them, confused.

“Please don’t leave. I just want to talk to you!”

“There’s nothing to talk about.” The Doctor’s tone has shifted from politely puzzled to cold and clipped.

With that, the girl with the ponytail is left behind.

—

Back at Rose’s flat, the Doctor throws open the fridge and pours himself a glass of orange juice.

“Doctor?”

“Hmm?”

“Why didn’t you want to talk to that girl? To Jenny?”

“She was speaking nonsense, wasn’t she?”

The Doctor’s still hidden behind the fridge door. Gently, Rose closes it and looks up at him.

“There’s something you’re not telling me.”

He shrugs. 

“Did I tell you about that day? About the kidnapping?” When Rose nods, he goes on. “Given the circumstances, I can say with 99.1% certainly that those researchers were unsuccessful in producing a clone from the tissue sample they stole from me. It’s nearly impossible.”

“Not completely!” Rose reasons. “Just a bit unlikely.”

“Rose, they—,” the Doctor pauses, gathering his thoughts. “They kidnapped me and stole a tissue sample from me. Even if they had managed to create a child, she wouldn’t be my daughter. Family is—family is more than that. And it’s been eighteen years! It they had been successful, someone would have found out before now. And certainly not the subject herself. Don’t you see, it makes no sense! Clearly this girl has got some kind of hidden motive.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

But Rose isn’t entirely convinced. There was something about Jenny—her bubbly attitude, the way she spoke—that reminded her of the Doctor.

—

At 3:30 AM, Donna finally decides to check Jenny’s room, just in case she’d come in through the window or something. Which was highly unlikely. Still, she can’t sleep before she knows where Jenny is.

The first thing Donna notices when she pushes the door open is that the window is wide open. The second thing she notices is the lump under the covers: Jenny is in bed, fast asleep. Donna lets out a long breath she didn’t know she’d been holding.

She walks to the window and sticks her head out, and the answer to what she’d been wondering makes itself known: the high ladder was still out, resting against the wall beneath the window. Lee hadn’t put it away after he’d come over to wash their windows the week before.

Donna wants to wake Jenny and ask her where she’s been, but it’s clear that the younger woman hadn’t wanted to speak to anyone at all.

Not right now.

Donna closes the window and leaves the room.

It’s a long time before she can fall asleep.

—

Jenny sleeps in, which is unlike her. Usually she’s up with the sun, and equally as bright despite the hour.

When she comes downstairs in the morning, Sylvia and Wilf are out at the shops, and Donna’s waiting in the kitchen with a pot of coffee.

“Morning, sunshine,” Donna says, voice gentle. “How was the party last night?”

“Good.”

“Coffee?”

“That’d be nice.”

Donna gets Jenny a cup and watches as she pours herself a bowl of cereal.

It’s quiet in the kitchen til Jenny’s finished her breakfast and gets up to wash her bowl.

“Donna?” She’s quiet, uncertain. “I need to talk to someone.”

—

The Nobles had adopted Jenny as a baby. No one had known who’d brought her to the orphanage; no one had known her birthday; no one had known her name. The folks there had estimated she was a few months old and invented a birthday for her certificate from there.

Geoff had been ill and passed away while Jenny was growing up, so she’d never really had a father: not even an adopted one. And Sylvia is… tough. She loves Donna and Jenny, but she’s hard on her elder daughter, and that makes Jenny sad.

Jenny’s favourite person in the world is Donna.

Donna who’s always been there for her. Donna who’s been the best big sister, and her best friend, despite their age difference. 

“I found my dad,” she tells her sister, sitting on the side of her bed and looking down at her knees. “He didn’t want to talk to me.”

“Oh, Jenny, I’m sorry.”

“But it’s more complicated than that.”

She grabs the article—she’d printed it out—off her desk, passes it to Donna, and sits back down again. Donna skims it and hands it back, frowning.

“What’s this mean?”

“I’m someone’s abandoned science experiment. They didn’t want me. My dad didn’t want me. It makes sense, though, you see? No one knows who my family is. What if I don’t have a whole family? What if I just have a dad?”

Jenny’s hands shake in her lap; she seems unsure what to do with them so Donna takes them in hers, steadying her.

“Nevermind him. I want you. I love you, you know that? And so does Mum. And so does Gramps.”

Jenny nods.

—

Later, when she’s alone, she looks at the date on the article again. _“On this day, eighteen years ago..."_

It’s quiet in her room, and dark, too. The only light is the streetlight coming in through the window and the sliver of hall light squeezing its way through the small gap under the door. Jenny looks out at the neighbouring houses, and she feels… wrong, somehow. It’s not like when she looks up at the stars. When Jenny looks at the stars, she feels small but awestruck. Now, she feels too big, like there’s no place in which she can possibly fit. Does she truly belong anywhere?

“Happy belated birthday, Jenny,” she says, and goes to bed.


	3. Chapter 3

Jenny doesn’t want to talk about it.

“I’m fine!” she tells her sister in next morning, voice deceivingly bright. “I’m just going to forget that the past couple days ever happened. Don’t worry about me.”

But Donna does.

“I made you a lunch for school.”

Donna hands over a brown paper bag with a sandwich and an apple, like Jenny usually makes for herself.

The blonde’s forced smile warms to a genuine one and she gives her sister a hug.

“Thank you.”

—

Jenny doesn’t go to school.

She means to, but when the bus she takes to the university comes by, it feels so _wrong_ that she runs the other way. There’s a playground around here. She’ll go there instead. She can’t face Donna again, not now, not when she’s trying to stop her from worrying.

Jenny sits at the top of the slide on the play structure and pretends that she’s a queen, or the commander of a whole army.

“Listen up, boys!” she tells the empty playground. “Things are going to be different with a woman in charge."

“Are big people allowed on here?” a little voice asks.

A small blonde boy has crept up behind her, waiting, presumably, for his turn on the slide.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” she says. “I didn’t know anyone else was here. Can you give me a push?” She turns and smiles at him, face open, friendly, childlike despite her age. 

“Okay!”

His enthusiastic little-boy voice makes Jenny grin, and two small hands on her back give her a bigger-than-anticipated push. She flies down the slide, laughing delightedly.

“Tony!” calls another voice. "What are you doing?”

“Sitting!” he says. And he is, right where Jenny had been. “Rooose. Can you push me? I want to go fast.”

A familiar woman appears around the side of the play structure.

“Hi!” Rose says, surprised. “What are you doing here?” Her eyes narrow a bit and she moves protectively closer to the boy on the slide. Jenny could guess what she was thinking.

“I’m not following you or anything. I live just down the street.” Jenny indicates the direction with her chin.

Rose nods.

“Just strange we’ve never run into you before this week.”

“I’ve got school and stuff. I’m usually at rugby. Rather than, you know, children’s playgrounds. I’m only here because…” She trails off.

“I’m sorry about the Doctor,” Rose starts to say, her expression softening. 

“Rose! Rose?”

“Sorry, Tony. Be right there.”

Smiling apologetically, Rose scales the short rock-climbing wall and joins Tony at the top of the slide.

“Ready?”

“Yes! Go!”

Jenny sits down on a bench at the side of the park, leans against the back of it, and kicks her legs half-heartedly. What on Earth is she doing? Her shoulders slump forwards and she lets out a sigh.

Rose comes to join her after a few minutes, letting Tony play on his own.

“He’s my brother, by the way,” she tells the younger blonde. “In case you were wondering. I babysit for Mum and Dad some days.”

Jenny shakes her head and for a moment there’s silence except for Tony’s toddler ramblings in the background.

“Do you believe the Doctor’s my Dad?”

Rose doesn’t meet her eye, but Jenny thinks it’s just because she’s keeping a watchful eye on Tony.

“I dunno what to think,” she says, careful. “But Tony seems to trust you. Normally he’s not good with strangers.”

“He seems sweet, Tony.”

“He is.” Rose smiles fondly.

“Do you think… I told my sister I’d give it up, but—do you think I could talk to him again? My Da—the Doctor.”

“I feel like I should tell you ‘no’,” Rose says. “I mean—you’re a stranger with an unlikely story. But—I don’t know why, but I trust you. I’ll talk to him, yeah? Maybe we can go out for dinner one day this week.”

“Really?” Jenny’s up on her feet in an instant, fact splitting into an enormous grin. “That would be nice! I’d love to have dinner!”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Her enthusiasm is contagious; Rose grins back.

—

Jenny’s still in the park after Rose and Tony leave, writing a message in the sand with her feet. It’s in her own secret language: a system of circles, dots, and lines.

She’s writing her name when the white van pulls up, and she looks up when the two men—the driver and the passenger—approach. 

“Hello, boys,” she says.

When the younger man grabs for her arm, she’s quick to react, bringing her knee up between his legs. He doubles over momentarily. 

Jenny's a more skilled fighter than they are, but they’re bigger and heavier and greater in number than she is.

Soon, she’s cornered against the rock-climbing wall and they’re on either side of her. The older man pulls something out of his shoulder bag.

Jenny’s last thought before the tranquilizer knocks her out is that Donna would really be worried now.

—

Jenny often attends events or visits friends after school, so Donna doesn’t worry until it’s dinnertime and she still hasn’t heard from her sister. 

_Where are you?_ she texts. 

An hour later, there’s still no answer, and she’s not in her room: Donna checks there.

She’s about to leave again when she notices something on Jenny’s desk. An address. Her supposed father’s place? Well, he is a renowned scientist. Donna supposes it wouldn’t be too hard to look him up.

—

The house is just down the street, so Donna throws on a jacket and tells Wilf not to wait up for her.

The man that opens the door is tall and thin, with a pinstriped suit and messy hair. Could use a few more pounds on him, Donna thinks. She greets him with a mask of calmness and courtesy.

“Hello. Are you the Doctor?”

“Yep! Last time I checked.”

“Well then,” Donna says, mask slipping already as her voice grew a little louder, “you’ve got some explaining to do.”

The man looks bewildered.

“What did I do?”

“You broke Jenny’s heart, that’s what. My sister. And now? She’s missing! Completely vanished! No message, no clues. Don’t suppose you have any idea _where_ she might be?”

A blonde woman appears at the door behind the Doctor.

“Jenny’s missing? But I just saw her earlier! I’m Rose,” she adds, before Donna can ask.

“Where did you see her? Do you teach at her school?”

“No; she was at the playground across the street. At around ten in the morning. Talked to her briefly. She seemed a bit sad, but fine otherwise.” Rose frowns.

Donna decides not to comment that Jenny should have been in class.

“Why don’t you come in?” Rose asks.

—

Donna doesn’t think it’s really the time for tea, but Rose makes a pot anyway, and they all sit down together at the kitchen table. The Doctor and Rose take one side; Donna takes the other.

“Where did she go when she left the park?” Donna asks Rose.

“Dunno! I left before she did. ‘Round half past ten.”

The Doctor puts his face in his hands.

“Do you know something?” Donna asks, still a little too loud.

“Them,” he mutters.

“What?” Donna raises her eyebrows and fixes him with a stare.

“It’s them,” he repeats. “Or, it might be. Could be. The ones who kidnapped me. It’s been eighteen years. If there had been a child, she’d be an adult now. Fully developed. How old is Jenny?”

“Eighteen.”

The Doctor slides his hands down his cheeks.

“Could be them. Not saying she is my—my daughter.” He shakes his head. "Just that they might think so. She fits the demographic.”

“What are you saying? That someone _kidnapped_ her?”

“Possibly. They might want to run tests. Intelligence, I’d assume.”

Donna feels ill with anxiety now; her stomach clenches and she hopes she won’t be sick. Normally it’s only heights that make her feel this way: she hates bridges for that reason. And this—this feels like the emotional equivalent of a bridge. She can see solid ground, but right now she's hanging above a void of increasingly worse possibilities, looking down.

Donna would rather look up, any day. 

“We _have_ to get her back!”

“I can’t imagine they’ll keep her very long,” the Doctor says slowly. “They didn’t with me.”

“So you suggest that we do _nothing_?” Donna bellows. “My sister might be _kidnapped_ , and you want to sit around and see if they just _bring_ her back? I don’t think so, skinny. I’m calling the police.”

“That’s not—that’s not what I’m saying. I think I might now where she is.” He stands up, looking more resolved now. “Call the police. We’re going to help them get Jenny back."


End file.
